We’re over halfway through the lecture phase of the Children at Risk School here in ywam sanjose. We thought we’d let you see first hand what students are learning, doing and discovering with us.

“…The facts are devastating. The stories broke our hearts, and it was difficult to emotionally handle the intensity of such a terrible topic. I became aware that Costa Rica is called “The Thailand of the West” in reference to the exploding numbers of tourists that come here for vacation and to enjoy legal and available prostitution. Because Costa Rica is such a safe and convenient country for Americans and Europeans to travel to, and considering its beauty and attractions, it has become a top destination for sex tourism. This means that the trafficking of women and children in and out of San Jose and different beach towns around the country is at an alarmingly high number.”

“This week was full of hard questions and inspiring ideas. We were probed to dig deeper inside ourselves. We learned how to ask the right questions and conduct research that will help us develop projects and create change…Something Dave said this week was that the excuse “I don’t have any personal responsibility,” has killed millions of people. When we look around at issues in the world and hear the stories, but simply say that it doesn’t affect us and not do anything about it…we are killing people. People are dying, because we just aren’t doing anything about it. “It’s not my responsibility,” or “I have my own life to worry about,” or “I’ve made a way for myself, why can’t they do the same?” When we don’t do anything about child prostitution, human trafficking, poverty, child soldiers, violence, racism, gangs…people are dying. This is our responsibility, our call as Christians and as people, really.

“This weekend most of the CRS class went to Jaco to do some prep work for their outreach there. Scott, our school leader also went, leaving Leslie with the boys. Being the wonderful, nice person that I am, I volunteered to help Leslie with the kiddos this weekend.”

“During the week we studied many cases of ministries and people who tried with good intentions to look out for children who were at risk, but either were not fruitful, or made some major mistakes. In most cases, many of the people who began ministries, and walked out their “word of the Lords” did so with poor planning and research. They failed to see what other ministries in the area were doing and why. And they failed to know the culture before asking the people of the community to “buy into” what they wanted to do.”

Amanda talks about our upcoming 6-month outreach and writes about what she saw in Jaco:

“It was hard for me not to get absolutely disgusted. I don’t even know how to describe what I saw. There were old men, young men, middle-aged men. They were mostly white, completely drunk and absolutely obnoxious. They were being swarmed by girls prostituting themselves, some sitting around, some heading off in Taxis with the girls. I wanted to punch those men, in all honesty.”

Last year the children at risk school spent three months in Jaco building relationships with the kids there and working with a woman named Bleu at an after-school program she started in one of the squatter communities by the river.

This weekend Scott, Kai, Ezzy and the children at risk school staff and students went to Jaco to visit some of the kids, Bleu and the river. This is a really sweet video about Bleu and the project our students worked with. You can really see and get an idea of what it is like there.

We found this article and wanted to share it. It is by a missionary in Africa and in it she shares her heart and pain over the situations she is seeing, the poverty all around her and children in need. She challenges Christians worldwide when she shares the facts. There are about 168.8 million children in the world in dire need…and 2.1 billion people who profess to be Christians. If only 8% of those Christians would help one needy child, all the children would be taken care of. She says, “I DO NOT BELIEVE that the God of the universe created too many children in His image and not enough love or food or care to go around. In fact I believe that He created the Body of Christ for just that, to help these little ones, the least of these. And I believe that except for a handful, the Body of Christ is failing.”

We are now finished with the second week of the children at risk school. We have nine students from Canada, Guatemala, Costa Rica, South Korea and the USA. It is amazing to see these guys come to this school where already we have covered some tough topics and they are all totally engaging. Even as we examine some of the horrible things happening to children they are not shrinking back. Looking into the issues affecting children is a painful, overwhelming thing and each one of us has to run to God. In Him is the only way we can handle it. It’s too painful, too big. So please be praying for this time for each of these students. The following photos are of Isaac, Anthony and Pablo giving presentations during class.

Also, we have been given an amazing opportunity to partner with Casa Viva (see the post below). Every Wednesday we will be picking up a family of five siblings who are living with five separate families. We bring them together to a central location so they can have some time together. This Wednesday was our first time and it was amazing to see how much these kids love one another. We are so glad that we can bring them together once a week for the rest of this school. The students also have other opportunities to work with ministries to children here in Costa Rica. This Saturday they worked with Metro Ministries an outreach to at risk children.

Each student has created a children at risk blog site where they are writing several updates each week. Click on the names below to find out more about what exactly they are learning and experiencing: